al Jazeera:

Israel pounds Beirut in ‘violent night’ of attacks on south suburbs

By Alastair Mccready

Published On 24 Oct 202424 Oct 2024

• Lebanon’s Health Ministry said at least one person was killed and five wounded as Israel carried out at least 17 strikes on Beirut’s suburbs overnight.
• Israel’s attack levelled six buildings in Beirut’s southern suburb of Laylaki in what Al Jazeera’s correspondent in Beirut described as a “very violent night” of strikes that began without warning.
• Gaza’s Government Media Office says more than 770 Palestinians have been killed and 1,000 wounded as the Israeli military attack on Jabalia and the siege of northern Gaza enters its 20th day.
• UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has warned that Palestinians “suffering under the ongoing Israeli siege in north Gaza are rapidly exhausting all available means for their survival”.
• In Gaza, at least 42,792 people have been killed and 100,412 wounded in Israeli attacks

• UN rapporteur calls for protection of Al Jazeera journalists

  Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territory, has said Israel’s declaration that six Al Jazeera journalists are members of Hamas or Islamic Jihad “sounds like a death sentence”.

  “These 6 Palestinians are among the last journalists surviving Israel’s onslaught in Gaza [with 130+ of their colleagues killed in the last year],” she wrote on X. “They must be protected at all costs.”

  The Israeli military has claimed, without providing evidence, that six journalists with the Al Jazeera Media Network “have been exposed as Hamas or Islamic Jihad terrorists”.

  Al Jazeera has strongly rejected the accusations, saying it views them “as a blatant attempt to silence the few remaining journalists in the region, thereby obscuring the harsh realities of the war from audiences worldwide”.

  The network noted that Israeli forces in Gaza have killed more than 100 journalists and media workers in the past year, including several Al Jazeera journalists, “in an attempt to silence the messenger”.
• 20m ago

   (00:15 GMT)

  Israel hits Beirut suburbs in 17 strikes overnight

  • 
    Laura Khan

  Reporting from Beirut, Lebanon

  It has indeed been a very violent night of strikes across those southern suburbs of Beirut. There were about 17 strikes in all. They started around 9pm local time.

  Israeli forces usually put out statements on social media creating the forced evacuations of areas, saying they are going to target specific buildings for being associated with Hezbollah. However, for the first three strikes, they gave no warning.

  They hit Haret Hreik and also Laylaki, where we have seen so much damage. Six buildings have been pretty much levelled and a fire broke out. We’ve seen dramatic images when the fire spread across to other buildings.  Authorities have yet to give any information as to the final amount of damage or whether indeed these fires have been put out. But certainly dramatic scenes.

  There were other attacks across Dahiyeh. This area has been evacuated for almost a month. A month ago this was a heavily populated area. People had their shops, their businesses and now they have been forced out, displaced. Many are coming to the centre of Beirut, where we are here.

  

  Smoke rises from the site of an Israeli airstrike that targeted a residential complex in the Laylaki neighbourhood in Beirut’s southern suburbs on October 23, 2024 [AFP]
• 27m ago

   (00:08 GMT)

  Israel’s war on Gaza: In numbers

  
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